“The fact that the Home Office continues to unlawfully hoard up to 20 million images of people makes a mockery of the long-held British principle that citizens are innocent until proven guilty. It is frankly chilling that some police forces are also now using these photos in automatic facial recognition systems within public surveillance cameras.

“The Home Office must respect the law and automatically delete all images of innocent people. The miniscule number of photos deleted is the unsurprising result of the Home Office’s obstructive, failed policy.”